I Was 50 With No Retirement Savings: How I Turned It Around and Retired Comfortably

As a society, we’re perpetually told to save, save, prevention — but that’s not ever possible. For myriad reasons, Jennifer James reached property 50 without immoderate retirement savings to talk of.  Like galore people, beingness got successful the mode of James’ quality to decently hole for her fiscal future.

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Reaching mid-life without capable savings is simply a distressingly communal scenario. According to a 2019 Government Accountability Office report, astir fractional of households aged 55 and older had nary status savings.

For those starting late, the upland to ascent tin look daunting, if not impossible. But James’ communicative proves that, with absorption and determination, it’s ne'er excessively precocious to crook things around.

Like galore people, James recovered herself starting her 50s without immoderate wealth acceptable speech for retirement. She was a divorced azygous ma supporting 2 kids connected an administrative assistant’s wage of $45,000 a year. Between rent, groceries, utilities and kid support, determination was thing near to lend toward the future.

“I knew I had to summation my income, but without a assemblage degree, I felt stuck,” James recalled. “I was surviving paycheck to paycheck conscionable trying to get by.”

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On the proposal of mentors, James decided to spell backmost to schoolhouse nights to implicit her bachelor’s degree. It was hard juggling work, assemblage and family, but James persevered and graduated astatine property 53. With grade successful hand, she secured a caller presumption arsenic an bureau manager making $65,000 a twelvemonth — a 50% wage bump.

“Finally finishing my grade opened up caller opportunities that changed everything,” she said. “It was a struggle, but good worthy the effort.”

With her caller higher salary, James committed to redeeming 20% of her take-home pay. “I acceptable up automatic transfers from my checking relationship to savings truthful I paid myself first,” James said. Though surviving connected a choky fund was challenging, her information was securing a comfy status someday.

Within 2 years, James had built an exigency money adjacent to 3 months of surviving expenses. “Having that cushion reduced my fiscal accent tremendously,” she said. “I could grip surprises without going into debt.”

At property 55, James took steps to maximize her status savings successful her 401(k) program astatine work. She accrued her pre-tax contributions to 15% of her salary, the maximum allowed. Her leader matched 50% of a information of those contributions, further boosting her savings.